Research Committee

[Tom Pellegrini]

I would like to thank Mr. Bishop and the members of the research committee for all their time and work fulfilling all the research requests. I believe the research letters are a real compliment to our fine firearms. Each of us has a story of finding our Parkers. Whether it be our first or another to add to the collection. Then we have the privilege to add another chapter to the story of how each Parker traveled through its life. One interesting part of a story of one of mine, as I mentioned to Mr. Bishop, is the chokes are reversed on my Grade #1 hammer gun. The open choke is in the left barrel while the tight choke is in the right. IC and Mod respectively. A little strange I thought, but I still enjoy shooting it. Thanks again to the research committee for a job well done.
Tom

[Dean Romig]

For those who don't know it - Chuck Bishop is the Research Committee.

The fact that his title is "Chairman, Research Committee" only means that if more people volunteer, they will answer to Chuck's excellent example.




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[Bill Murphy]

Dean, let's be honest. More people have volunteered to assist with the research committee. They have been rebuffed. Chuck is doing a wonderful job and I appreciate his hard work.

[Dean Romig]

That aside Bill, Chuck is the Research Committee.




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[Bill Murphy]

Dean, you may have to retract your statement "If more people volunteer.". More people have volunteered and been rebuffed. I am comfortable in my position with PGCA, "Life Member who has volunteered to assist and been rebuffed.".

[William Davis]

My 10 G Parker Hammer is reverse choked, have a Birmingham Hammer gun reverse too.

William

[Mark Conrad]

Tom, thank you for your post. Chuck works very hard at this job and gets no compensation for it. My hats off to Chuck for taking on these duties.

[Chuck Bishop]

Thank you Tom and everyone else for your nice comments.

Yes, I'm the chairman and the committee all rolled into one. When I was asked if I wanted to be more involved with the PGCA, the only thing I could think of was possibly to help Mark Conrad with the research letters. I had done much genealogy research and reading old documents was very interesting to me. Once I saw how the research on Parkers were done, I realized that it's a job for one person only because the books and database is all in one place and one person can do it all. Volunteers were needed when the copies were made in Ilion years ago and possibly when the records eventually get digitized, we will need volunteers to help again.

One last thing, I try to get the letters out in 1 or 2 days after receiving the form. If you don't get your letter within 2 weeks, contact me! I sent out a letter in the middle of September to a P.O. Box, it sat there for weeks before it was returned to me. It's also important to include your e-mail address and/or your telephone number on the research form in case I need to contact you.

Regards....Chuck

[Dean Romig]

You're doing a great job Chuck, and I can't think of anyone better suited to the job.

Keep up the Great Work!





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[Gary Carmichael Sr]

I second what Dean said, Gary

[Bill Holcombe]

Chuck, you do an awesome job! Thanks for all your hard work!

[Bob Brown]

Hello Chuck, it has been a little over a few weeks for those two letters I requested. Was there a problem with my info, or does it just take a bit longer for letters to Canada?
I used the paypal route for the letters and that is a great upgrade. Much simpler than going to the bank and picking up a U.S. dollar bank check or money order and mailing it in. I only have one suggestion, the form letter to request a letter is a pdf file. Am I right in thinking that unless you have Adobe Writer rather than Adobe Reader like most of us we can't open and add info onto the form and save it? I tried filling it in and saving it several times and each time it saved as blank form. Would it be possible to post it as a Word file? Also, is it possible to email a pdf of the letter as soon as it is done or is that done now when requested?
Thanks again Chuck for being the Research Committee. It brings an added dimension to caring for these Parkers to see that there were caretakers before us, and remind that there will be others after.

[Chuck Bishop]

Hello Bob, thanks for your good questions.

I completed your letters September 30th and either mailed them that day or a few days later. If you don't get them by the end of the week, let me know and I'll mail you again. I'd rather wait a few days, it's expensive to mail them to Canada. I sent them to your P.O. Box 26 in Canada. Let me answer a few more questions below.

Yes I can send you an attachment of your letter via e-mail and I'll do that for you Bob. I do not send copies via e-mail unless specifically requested. I understand that there sometimes is a need to get the information contained in the letter right away if contemplating a purchase. No problem, just let me know either in the comments section or by e-mail. If you don't need the info right away, wait till the letter arrives.

Lastly, I know that some people have problems filling out the forms, I get copied by Mary in her response to people who send in blank forms. I found out why this happens and I'll get Mr. John Dunkle to fix it but for now, here is what you do. You do need Adobe Reader, just download it, it's free. If you can't enter information into the research form, look at the top and see if it opened the form in Microsoft Word. That's not good! Look at the top right of the page, you should see a box that says "Open With Different Viewer". Click on this, then tell it to Open With Adobe Viewer. You should now see each line highlighted and will be able to type in the information. Remember to save the document to someplace you can find it such as your desktop.

I'm going to contact John (maybe he's reading this:bigbye:) and have the Word documents changed to Acrobat.

[Chuck Bishop]

I just thought of something else. I use Firefox for my web browser and that's the way the research forms worked for me. I opened up the Internet Explorer and tried that browser. When I tried to open a link to the research form that had the Adobe icon as part of the link it worked fine. Any other link to the research letter form that did not have the Adobe icon, my browser locked up. Isn't this fun:nono::banghead:

[Bob Brown]

Thanks very much for the explanation, Chuck. I must have wrote the wrong P.O. box in my email. It should have been Box 29, not 26. I'll talk to the post office and see if they can catch the letter or track it down.
I can open the letter request form in Adobe and I can enter the info on the proper lines. The extension has pdf. at the end. What I can't do is save it. When I go to save the filled in form it saves it as a blank request form. I'm using Google Chrome as my browser.
Very fun info in the letters. The DH12 was another Hingston Smith Arms Company gun out of my home town of Winnipeg. Ordered by Dubray no less.

[Bob Brown]

The letters arrived yesterday, Chuck. At least they made it into my post office box yesterday. The box number was crossed out and 29 wrote over, so the ladies at the post office must have caught it. Thanks again.
These letters are often a link to history that can bring much more enjoyment to owning a Parker than what we see in our hands. The letter confirmed the 1914 VHE 20's chambers are original at 2 7/8" and it was supplied with the pad, straight stock, and a Lyman ivory bead. The person who ordered it was E.B. Hutchinson of Neche, North Dakota. A quick internet search brought up ND archives with info on E.R. Hutchinson, who I think is his father, and his mother, dodging natives with a small group and trying to escape to Fort Garry in Manitoba during an Indian Uprising in 1860. And how E.B. Hutchinson worked on building a river boat in 1914, the same year the 20 was ordered. There is a lot more info on the family that I'll read up on. We've all looked at our vintage guns and wondered about their past, it is nice to have a bit of their history. A bargain at $40.
Also nice to see the 1902 DH12 was ordered with 2 3/4" chambers. I had wondered if there had been some work done on it.

[Erick Dorr]

I want to add my thanks to Research Chairman Chuck Bishop I ordered a letter on the 8th. The letter was dated the 9th and I received it on the 14th with a Sunday and Holiday thrown into the timeline. Outstanding service.
I had trouble with the form fields. I received a message that the there were form fields that were not supported. I needed to first save the document then open it in Adobe, complete it and save it then post it to my email order for the letter.
Erick

[Bob Brown]

Thanks Eric. I tried filling in a saved letter pdf after opening it in Adobe and I was able to save it with the entered info. As long as it was saved and reopened before entering info it worked fine.

[Mills Morrison]

That is cool to have one ordered by dubray. Probably ordered for resale but still

[George M. Purtill]

Chuck does a fabulous job reading hieroglyphics and converting them to English.
Conrad, the magnificent, was also omniscient.
It is a tough job. But a very important job.
Chuck makes writing a research article much easier.
Thanks to Chuck who stands on the shoulders of Mark.

[Jean Swanson]

George and all:

Both Mark and Chuck have done outstanding work managing the research arm of the PGCA, but do not forget Ron Kirby's efforts in this endeavor. As I recall Ron was there when we copied the records and, with help, created the first data base that was used for letters until around 2003. Thru Marks efforts, a new and expanded data base was established and is currently being used. All of these guys need a standing ovation for their volunteer efforts.

The PGCA has grown to around 1350 members and without volunteers, such as these three guys, and a strong membership we would not be one of the most successful gun organizations.

Allan

[George M. Purtill]

True Allan.
Kirby's letters appear now and then and I am reminded how long we have been at this.
Thanks for reminding us all.
Old guys like you are invaluable for our institutional memory.

[Jean Swanson]

OLD GUYS------------do not forget the mirror !!!!

[Bill Murphy]

Allan only subliminally mentioned that he was also part of the hard working PGCA Research Team that copied the records in 1998. Thanks, Allan.